On the Tower

(A play in one act.)

The Knight.
The Lady.

Voices of men and women on the ground at the foot of the tower.
The voice of the Knight's Page.

The top of a high battlemented tower of a castle. A stone ledge,
which serves as a seat, extends part way around the parapet.
Small clouds float by in the blue sky, and occasionally a swallow
passes.
Entrance R. from an unseen stairway which is supposed to extend
around the outside of the tower.

The Lady (unseen).
Oh do not climb so fast, for I am faint
With looking down the tower to where the earth
Lies dreaming in the sun. I fear to fall.

The Knight (unseen).
Lean on me, love, my love, and look not down.

L.
Call me not "love", call me your conquered foe,
That now, since you have battered down her gates,
Gives you the keys that lock the highest tower
And mounts with you to prove her homage true;
Oh bid me go no farther lest I fall,
My foot has slipped upon the rain-worn stones,
Why are the stairs so narrow and so steep?
Let us go back, my lord.

K.
Are you afraid,
Who were so dauntless till the walls gave way?
Courage, my sweet. I would that I could climb
A thousand times by wind-swept stairs like these,
That lead so near to heaven.

L.
Sir, you may,
You are a knight and very valorous;
I am a woman. I shall never come
This way but once.
(The Knight and the Lady appear on the top of the tower.)

K.
Kiss me at last, my love.

L.
Oh, my sweet lord, I am too tired to kiss.
Look how the earth is like an emerald,
With rivers veined and flawed with fallow fields.

K. (Lifting her veil)
Then I kiss you, a thousand thousand kisses
For all the days ere I had won to you
Beyond the walls and gates you barred so close.
Call me at last your love, your castle's lord.

L. (After a pause)
I love you.

(She kisses him. Her veil blows away like a white butterfly
over the parapet. Faint cries and laughter from men and women
under the tower.)

Men and Women.
The veil, the lady's veil!

(The knight takes the lady in his arms.)

L.
My lord, I pray you loose me from your arms
Lest that my people see how much we love.

K.
May they not see us? All of them have loved.

L.
But you have been an enemy, my lord,
With walls between us and with moss-grown moats,
Now on a sudden must I ki